In The Course Of Justice
by doctorjay
Summary: Lewis and Hathaway become involved in the strange case of a dead writer with possible ties to Oxford's immigrant community. Now complete! No slash but violence and cursing, so rated T for safety.
1. Chapter 1

Ch. 1 Mess

The evening of 17 July was hot. When the call came through for the Oxford police at 9:11 pm, it got even hotter. Loud voices and gunshots were reported at the home of a well-known local writer of popular science books.

Responding constables forced open the door indicated by an elderly neighbor and found: a sitting room spattered with blood, a dead man, no murder weapon and no immediate suspects. The crime scene was sealed, the medical examiner and more police dispatched.

Chief Superintendent Jean Innocent reminded herself that Detective Inspector Robbie Lewis and Detective Sergeant James Hathaway were the best investigative team she had. If anyone could get to the bottom of the mess, they could.

The two detectives, sweating in their protective blue SOCO suits, entered the second floor flat, carefully avoiding the bloody corpse –for now. "Nice," Sgt. Hathaway remarked approvingly, looking around.

The apartment's rooms were comfortably stuffed with shabby furniture and flea-market kitsch. On the wall over a cluttered desk, a rusted barometer hung next to a framed yellowed 1930's-era periodic table.

A miniature billiards set occupied one corner. A bookshelf held a colorful collection of toy robots; another displayed an assortment of vintage clocks and watches.

"Interesting place. Like a museum for overgrown children," the young sergeant said.

"Lovely," Inspector Lewis replied, frowning, "Long as you aren't put off by the odd dead guy lying on the carpet."

Haphazard piles of books and papers formed hourglass shapes on nearly every flat surface. Some had apparently been toppled by the event that had led to the onslaught of plastic suits and gloves.

On the floor of the otherwise pleasant sitting room lay the tenant whose carefully decorated home would never again comfort, inspire or entertain him. Dr. Laura Hobson, her petite form lost in voluminous white folds, squatted by the mess that had once been science writer Michael Blethyn.

Nobody would recognize him now, if they only knew his handsome face from the back cover of one of his best-selling books.

"Shot in the head at rather close range, resulting in pretty obvious massive facial trauma," the blonde medical examiner said. "Have to wait till we can dig around for the bullet. Judging by the degree of what we in the field call 'bursting' I would say it was a high-velocity firearm. Hard to say exactly where the entry wound was. As you can see there's not much—"

"—left of the face. Yeah, we can see that, doctor. Poor bastard." Lewis shook his head. While violent death didn't physically sicken him, as it had his mentor Morse, it still dismayed Lewis that people could do such things to one another.

His partner was, incongruously, bending over the DVD player. "What did you find?" Lewis asked. He knew his sergeant had a feel for small details that others missed.

Hathaway straightened up, looking like a six-foot-tall blue mummy, a plastic DVD case between gloved thumb and forefinger.

"_Secrets and Lies_", he read. "Looks to be the last thing somebody watched. Did you like that film, sir?"

"Naw. Where were they supposed to be from, anyway, East End? Sounded more like Americans to me." Lewis, ignoring his sergeant's bemused expression, examined the contents of an antique roll-top desk. He noted that the papers and books, like much of the décor, had a scientific flavor. "Couldn't fathom their accents."

Dr. Hobson hid her smile, sobering as she returned to the ruined faceless corpse.

Murder. Nasty. What a mess. What a headache. Lewis let his hand drift towards his temple, then remembered the plastic gloves. "James. What about the neighbors? Who was paying attention?"

Hathaway indicated the flat facing with a nod. "A Mrs. Banbury heard raised voices and then several loud bangs. She's the one who called 999."

Lewis raised his eyebrows. "A Mrs. Banbury? Sounds like someone out of Monty Python."

"We should talk to her, sir. Nosy, about 80 and spends all day puttering about the house."

"Lead on, then, MacHathaway."

"I need to warn you, though, sir. She may be a bit difficult for you to understand. Her accent."

Hathaway's idea of a joke, thought Lewis. Mrs. Edward Banbury—Gracie- spoke perfect English- classic Newcastle Geordie. A tiny figure in a red running suit and white trainers, with curly white hair and bright blue eyes, she looked like one of Father Christmas' retired elves.

"Aye, bonny lad. As I was jist tellin' this underfed baby beanpole here. We heard arguin' and then we heard bang, bang, bang, just like on the telly. Only louder."

The two detectives sat in a homey kitchen, sipping tea and eating packaged biscuits as if it was noon instead of half 10 at night. Lewis found it amusing to be referred to as a "lad" let alone a "bonny" one.

"Sorry not to hev summat nicer, like. Wasna expectin' company, me. And two sich canny gennelemen."

"Not a problem, ma'am," Lewis said. "We're grateful to have such an observant witness." He resisted slipping into full Geordie mode, despite the relaxed feeling he got from hearing the pleasantly familiar inflection and expressions.

"Who was it you heard arguing, Mrs. Banbury?" Hathaway asked.

"Oh, must've been thon professor and the young black lad, wasn't it?"

The two men shared a glance.

"A black man?" Lewis prodded. "Black like an African or Jamaican?"

"Nah. The other black. Pakis we called 'em. People that came from India, like. That kind of black. More tea, Inspector?" Hathaway noticed that Mrs. Banbury was not nearly as solicitous to him, just an underfed baby beanpole, like.

Lewis shook his head. "No thanks, ma'am. I'm fine, me. Did this, ah, black man visit Mr. Blethyn often?"

"I should say he did, saw him a few times, me. They'd had rows before, y'know."

She patted her white curls and gave Lewis a speculative once over, her bright eyes fixing on his belt buckle. Or so Lewis hoped.

"You married, Inspector?" Lewis cleared his throat, but before he could reply, Mrs. Banbury winked and said, "Thon's a reet bonny bait-box y'have there, lad. I'd like to get my gob aroond yer tackle, me."

Lewis reddened and coughed. Hathaway raised an eyebrow and smoothly intervened. "Did you see the black man enter the flat tonight, ma'am?"

Mrs. Banbury turned to the sergeant with slight annoyance. "Nah, I sure didn't, young man. But we were out in the garden and saw him gan oot. Reet afore we heard them bangs."She nudged the biscuit plate closer to Lewis.

Hathaway continued before she could start flirting with his partner again. "Did the black man seem angry, upset or frightened when he left?"

"Hmmm. Nivver frightened, exactly. Kinda upset. Fretful, like. Spoke to us real rude, he did. Said, 'Mnd yer aan business' er some sich and then stomped awa'."

Lewis asked, "You are sure that you heard the gunshots _after_ the black man left?"

Delighted, Mrs. Banbury turned back to the senior partner. "Oh, aye. I was back in me house by then. Was comin' on dark and tisn't safe for lasses t'be oot alone. Maybe the black lad came back and shot the professor when we weren't lookin'."

"Were there other frequent visitors?" Hathaway asked.

"Oh aye, of course there was his fee-ance. Lovely Irish lass.A doctor or some sich. So sad, now that he's gotten himself murdered, isn't it?"

It was all Lewis could do to keep Mrs. Banbury from jumping up to bake them some fresh scones, reminding her gently of the lateness of the hour. They left their cards with the little woman, asking her to call if she remembered anything else. She assured them that she certainly would call, seeing as it would be "hard to forget a couple of lads as well-fard" as they. The two men stepped outside, watching as the SOCO packed their equipment away.

"Hmm. Sir. What was Mrs. Banbury talking about back there, when she said something about gobbing around your tackle?" The sergeant was innocence embodied, his face as bland as Yorkshire pudding.

"Tell you when you're older," Lewis muttered, face reddening again.

"Guess we'll have to wait and ask our Mum, then, me," Hathaway said, smiling.

"You do the worst excuse for a northern accent I have ever heard."

"I was trying for American. I'm surprised you even understood me."

As they walked towards the car, they saw the coroner's van pulling away from the curb. "Invasion of the body snatchers, sir."

"Hmmph. I'm not looking forward to telling that fee-ance, I can tell you."

_-Not at all what I expected. When Brett first told me about this "short-term overseas opportunity", being hunkered down with eleven foul-mouthed, rough-edged, unwashed soldiers and lorry drivers in a godforsaken desert for three months was the farthest thing from my mind. But silly me, I said yes, because the money was too good to pass up. What other chance would I ever get to make $15,000, US currency, tax free and legal? Beat another boring summer shelving books and running a cash register for little more than pocket money, barely meeting my living expenses. I would get to use my math and computer skills, Brett said. Plus airfare and living allowance provided. And talk about adventure! No, I could not have turned it down, even knowing what I know now. We get a $2000 bonus if we complete the contract. To be honest, it's only the money that keeps me here. That, and not being a nancy-boy quitter, as Brett would say. If I stay the full contract, nobody could say I wasn't a real man. _


	2. Chapter 2

Ch. Two

Trouble

They notified the victim's family the next morning. It was a Saturday. The Blethyns lived in a working class neighborhood in a small, semi-detached, well-kept home. The detectives had to shout their introductions over the rattle of an elderly room air conditioner, so Lewis asked them to please turn it off so they wouldn't have to announce their sad news to the entire street. The Blethyns seemed like ordinary working people, surprised by the violent death that had, overnight, reduced their number from four to three.

Michael Blethyn's books were proudly displayed in a case, apparently unread. "Autographed," Mrs. Blethyn explained sadly.

Anna Blethyn was a short woman with dyed red hair, her plump form clad in a Starbucks t-shirt and a pair of highwater mom jeans.

"Why would anyone want to kill him?" the soft-spoken mother said between sobs. "Mikey liked making up puzzles, playing billiards, reading books and such." She sagged into a worn upholstered armchair, gazing at her short, wide, bare feet, the bright fuchsia toes mocking her with their frivolousness.

"Sent money regular after he moved out," rumbled the father, Carl. He was a big, gruff man with short gray hair and a no-nonsense manner. "Never caused us any trouble, not like that one—" here he jerked a thumb at a lanky teenager who had been lying on the couch playing a video game.

Hathaway noticed that the boy had risen reluctantly to join his parents, realizing that this was a serious family event that might merit a few minutes of his attention.

"Except for…" The big man stopped and the couple looked at each other.

"Except what?" Lewis probed.

"Well, it took him a long time to figure out what he wanted to do. As a career like. And to settle down and get a girl, this Maria. Now this. What a world." The detectives watched as he laid an enormous bear-like arm around his wife's shaking shoulders.

The couple seemed more saddened and confused than shocked. Lewis figured that this family had weathered their share of hardships, and did not expect that good things were meant to last. Now they had to face the fact that their quiet, studious older son, newly famous for writing books about unfathomable topics, was, quite suddenly, dead.

The younger brother, Tad, aged 18, wore a sleeveless red T-shirt with a large black Soviet hammer and sickle emblazoned across the front. Knee-length black shorts and, incongruously, green corduroy house slippers completed his ensemble. Tad's eyes were hidden behind the dark, shaggy Beatle-esque mop that was again in vogue.

He contributed, "Mikey never did nothing, like. People used to think he was, like, a fruit. You know, with his puzzles and all. Then he got engaged and everything. Started selling books, got on tv and everything. How could he end up shot?" He went back to the couch and his video game, back into the one place where life was fair and comprehensible.

Afterwards, the two detectives sat in a café, letting their fish and chips grow cold.

"His parents were a dead end, so to speak," said Lewis, chewing on a tasteless piece of fish. "He hasn't lived with them since leaving school—they didn't seem to know much about him."

Hathaway suggested, "We should check on the brother. He might occasionally get enough fire under him to get off the couch and commit a crime."

Lewis smirked. "Murder? We'll look into it, but I doubt Tad has ever killed anything except his own brain cells. Next up is the dentist girlfriend—that lovely Irish fee-ance. She should at least know something about his day-to-day life."

It was still early in the afternoon. They called on the dentist at her place of work, a large, sleek, modern office, all colorful tile and shiny chrome fixtures. A sign promised the most advanced and up-to-date whitening products, brightening methods and corrective techniques.

"Whatever will distinguish us from the rest of the world if we all buy nice teeth, sir?" Hathaway asked, _sotto voce_.

"With friends like you, who needs the French?" his boss replied, getting a chuckle from the sergeant. "Besides, it's a myth that all British people have bad teeth. Michael York had beautiful teeth."

"Who?"

"You know, the blonde actor who shagged everyone in _Cabaret_—oh, you're having a wind up."

"Terry-Thomas, sir."

"Okay, I'll give you Terry-Thomas."

"Mike Myers. Speaking of shagging."

"Those aren't his teeth. And he's not even British."

"The Beatles, sir. They could barely talk."

"It wasn't because of their teeth."

Assistant Magda, a petite, blonde twenty-something with an Eastern European accent, efficiently paged Dr. Maria Coniff to the front desk. The dentist was tall, with long curly black hair, large dark eyes and a round, plump mouth full of gorgeous white teeth. She was a walking advertisement to all of the benefits of good genes and 21st century dentistry. The trim white lab coat covering her stylish green pants outfit couldn't disguise her curvy figure. She was more than a lovely Irish lass; she was an absolute stunner.

They introduced themselves as police detectives, and Dr Coniff looked confused. "I already made out a report for the insurance," she said in a soft, musical burr. "I didn't think it was important enough to bother the police again."

Lewis glanced at Hathaway. "Uh, what report are you talking about, ma'am?"

The dentist gestured at a cabinet in the next room. "Someone broke into the office and pilfered supplies from the cabinet there."

"You were robbed? When was that?"

"Two nights ago. Magda and I came in yesterday morning and found the front door open. The cabinet lock was broken, too."

"Looking for drugs, were they?" Lewis asked.

"Maybe, but they left empty-handed on that score. We keep anything resembling a controlled substance in a special set of drawers, with time locks. I guess they were so disappointed that they just grabbed some random things from the open shelves and drawers."

Hathaway looked up from his notebook. "What kind of random things?" he asked.

"Oh, some toothbrushes, packets of dissolvable sutures, dental floss, toothpaste samples, small bottles of mouthwash. Loose stuff, nothing very valuable." She shrugged. "The other three dentists who share this office space agreed with me that it was no big deal."

"Ah. Well, I'm afraid that the break-in was not what brings us here now, ma'am." Lewis took a breath, his features somber and sympathetic.

Hathaway always hated this part of the job, was happy to let the senior partner handle it.

The dentist looked concerned, then alarmed. "Is someone hurt? Is it my mother?"

Lewis shook his head. "No, ma'am. I'm very sorry to have to tell you that your friend Mr. Blethyn is dead."

"Michael? No." She smiled shakily. "That must be a mistake. We have a dinner date tonight in just a few hours, in fact." She checked her watch as it to confirm the reality of her information.

"That may be so, ma'am, but we were called to Mr. Blethyn's home last night. He died of a gunshot wound."

The distraught woman got up from her desk and then sat down again. "That's impossible," she said softly. "He was shot? Who shot him? Where is he?"

Her voice rose and she stood up again. "Magda! Get Michael on the phone, please. His cell."

Lewis pressed his lips together and waited.

"No answer, Doctor," the receptionist called back. "Straight to voice mail."

"Dr. Coniff," Lewis said. "We have notified the family. Mr. Blethyn's body is—"

"No! I don't believe you!" she yelled.

She looked from one solemn face to the other and realization dawned. Her beautiful face crumpled into tears and she pushed her fist against her mouth. She shook her head. "No. Not possible," she moaned.

Hathaway got a paper cup and filled it with water.

"Thank you, Sergeant," Dr. Coniff said softly, accepting the water. The crying had stopped almost as quickly as it had started.

Lewis sighed. "This is very hard for you, we know."

Dark eyes, reddened by crying, glared at him. "No, you don't know, Inspector. This is just your job. Michael and I were engaged to be married. And now he's…. How could you know what that's like?"

She went on, sobbing, "We had a great future planned—did you know he had just signed on with an American publishing company to produce a book series? He was a good man, quiet, thoughtful, kind. Nobody had any reason to hurt him. You people come in here and tell me he's dead, and you think you know how I feel?"

Hathaway shot a quick look at his boss, aware that Lewis still grieved his wife's untimely death. The inspector's face was set in a stony mask of professional sympathy, but when he spoke his voice was hoarse.

"I'm sorry, miss," Lewis said quietly. "I truly am."

Later, at the car, the inspector allowed Hathaway to take the wheel, content to sit back and ride. After a few minutes, the sergeant said sympathetically, "She didn't have any way of knowing what she was saying, sir."

"Of course not," Lewis said quickly.

The inspector, in a somber mood, left work early. He was sorely tempted to find solace in a bottle. But he managed to avoid drinking by going for a long walk and thinking about the case. There had been no break-in or robbery at the victim's house, but Michael Blethyn, beloved, successful, quiet, thoughtful and kind, also had at least one enemy. And there _had_ been a robbery at Blethyn's girlfriend's office—if you could call that petty pilfering a robbery.

Hathaway stayed at the office updating the whiteboard in the incident room. He went home late feeling rather melancholy, spent a restless evening, and finally went to bed at midnight.

At 2am he awoke from a harrowing nightmare. He had dreamed he was back at the crime scene, leaning over the murdered Blethyn. To his horror, the body on the carpet had been transformed into his own. The zombie-like face, dripping gore, grinned up at him sloppily and gurgled, "You have been forgiven, my son."

A bloodied claw reached out, offering a gruesome benediction. Hathaway frantically backed away from his undead twin and fell over a chair. The icy hand seized his leg and he sat up, awake and sweating, tangled in the sheet. Hathaway rose and washed his face, then, with shaking hands, poured himself a large glass of wine.

_-Just like back home. Things always are the most difficult during the down time. I only want to read, write and think. Maybe work on a puzzle or two. Be left alone. And the other chaps want to get drunk, smoke dope, look for women and carouse. God I hate them. They brag about it all in ways that make me sick. Jerks. How cheap the girls are here. How easy they are. How young. How eager to please. Meaning that they are having sexual relations with what are basically just desperate hungry children. Because they have money and the people here have nothing. If they did this shit in a civilized country they'd be in jail. Don't they have little sisters back home? _

_Not as much bragging but enough jokes to tell me that a few of them have found that the boys are as cheap and easy as the girls. Tad is a cheeky brat but I would never want him to….._

_I miss Maria. I even miss Mum and Dad. (Not Tad, though.) I just want to do my job, mind my own business, get out of here and get my money. I have to keep focused on the goal. Money to be able to stay home and work on my book draft. Money to help out Mum and Dad. We are allowed to send email but it has to be cleared by Central first. I don't care—I'm not about to tell anyone what it's really like over here. Not while I'm here. Maybe not ever._


	3. Chapter 3

Random

By Monday morning, Dr. Hobson's report was ready. She met with Lewis and Hathaway in their office and shared her results along with an early coffee break. The analysis revealed that the weapon was probably a .357 Magnum loaded with Glazer frangible bullets. The bullet had fragmented upon impact, disintegrating the victim's skull. "With a gun of that size, and a bullet like that, you don't have to be very close to get the kind of result we saw." The two detectives grimaced, recalling the faceless corpse. Hobson had also noted one curious detail: gunshot residue on _both_ of the victim's hands. "That supports my initial assessment of an assailant standing quite close to the victim," the forensic expert said, paging through her notes.

"Why is that?" asked Hathaway, taking a generous swallow of his coffee. It was the second cup, Lewis noticed, and the sergeant looked weary, even after a day away from the case.

"Well, _no_ residue detected would indicate that the victim was far away from the person holding the weapon. Residue on only one hand would be more typical of a self-inflicted handgun wound." Dr. Hobson gestured as if she were aiming a gun at herself. "Since we still haven't found said weapon, self-inflicted wounding is contraindicated at this time."

"So, residue on both hands means that there might have been a struggle over the weapon," suggested Lewis, thoughtfully.

"Full marks, Inspector," said Dr. Hobson. Then she frowned. "But in cases where the weapon was found nearby, it could also indicate that the victim shot himself, steadying the weapon with the non-firing hand." She demonstrated again with both her hands holding an imaginary weapon.

Later that morning, Dr. Maria Coniff arrived to formally identify the dead writer's body. She had volunteered, explaining that it would be much less traumatizing for her, a medical professional, than for his parents. Dr. Hobson had done her best at cleaning up the victim, but there still was not much of a face. Nonetheless, Dr. Coniff was able to state, without flinching, that it was definitely Michael Blethyn. "His teeth," she said. "I never forget a bite."She even managed a brief smile before breaking down and being led away by a WPC.

Afterwards, when Hathaway brought Lewis _his_ second coffee, the sergeant noticed the worry lines around the older man's eyes were deeper, making him look tired and sad.

Lewis often looked this way when he had been brooding about his wife's death. The sergeant figured it was the result of holding back feelings of grief—maybe the strain of trying not to cry.

Hathaway sat down at his computer.

"Okay, let's hear it," the inspector said, rubbing his eyes. Damn murder cases.

"Hear what, sir?" Hathaway, bent mantis-like over his keyboard, mimicked his boss unconsciously by drawing a weary hand across his face. He had slept so badly after the awful dream.

"Let's hear your brilliant ideas. What's wrong with the case?"

Hathaway inhaled sharply and looked up. "A break-in at the dentist's office a few days before the guy died. It bothers me."

"Me, too. I don't like coincidences." Lewis shrugged. "But Dr. Cardiff said nothing valuable was taken."

"No. Just random things. But mathematically speaking, 'random' means every object had an equal chance of being stolen. Set theory."

"Oh no, not _set theory_, whatever that is when it's at home."

"Seriously, sir. I'm thinking of the set of things taken. She said 'random', but it wasn't truly a random set."

"It wasn't."Lewis raised a skeptical eyebrow.

"No, sir. Four of the things fit and one doesn't."

"James ….you feeling all right? We have a writer locked in his room with half his head shot away, a grieving family, a heartbroken dentist, a mysterious missing black man, and you're worried about shoplifted toothpaste and floss? Should we be on the lookout for a Pakistani Dirty Harry with really good dental hygiene?"

"That's the problem, sir. The toothpaste and mouthwash and so on. That's the kind of loot anyone would lift from a dentist's office. Everyone uses that stuff and you can give it away if you don't want it."

"Yeah, so?"

"I'll bet that the toothpaste and similar were all kept in the same drawer or cabinet, too."

"Yeah, so?"

"Yeah, so, why steal _sutures_? Have we noticed a sudden rise in the illicit home dental surgery trade? Perhaps a spate of aggressive kite-flying among the youth gangs in the housing estates?"

"Sutures were kept in a different place from the other supplies, probably not as easy to find. So they took toothpaste to cover up the suture theft."

"That's my problem, sir. Why sutures?"

"Obviously, to tie up your science writer boyfriend with before you shoot his face off—that's it, the dentist did it. _Cherchez la femme_. Case closed."

"Case not closed. _La femme_ has an alibi—one night a week she works late to accommodate patients who can't make the day appointments. The sparkly dentists in the shiny office all take their turns."

"And the Friday night Blethyn was killed was her assigned late night. That's why they had the dinner date for Saturday."

"Yes. I checked. Besides he wasn't tied up with suture."

"I was only joking about that bit," Lewis said.

Hathaway looked thoughtful again. "Was there a lot of extra toothpaste in his house?"

"Will you get off the toothpaste, James? If I was dating a dentist my house would be full of free toothpaste."

"But would your house be full of free sutures, too?"

"Dunno. Depends on what she was into, nudge, nudge, wink, wink."

"Are you planning some inappropriate comments using terms like 'oral', 'drill' and 'cavity', sir?"

"-!"

"So, are we talking kinky dentistry practices gone awry?" Hathaway asked, relieved that the grim conversation had taken a lighter tone.

"My dentist looked like her, I swear I'd have the biggest, hardest, strongest, straightest, healthiest….dentition, ummm-" mused Lewis dreamily. "What were we talking about again sergeant?"

"The case of the missing dental supplies," Hathaway began, but his voice choked off. Bloody nightmare images swirled before his eyes, and he shuddered. The awful dream had tormented him again the night before and he hadn't been able to shake the haunted feeling.

Lewis saw the color drain from his sergeant's face. "Okay, something else is on your mind, besides the beauteous Irish dentist."

Hathaway tapped a pencil nervously against his coffee cup. "That crime scene made me….uneasy." At Lewis' exasperated look, he shook his head. "It felt wrong. It's disturbed me, and after this weekend, I think I know why."

Lewis gestured towards the door. "You need a smoke, don't you? And I could certainly use some air."

_Last night Lt. Grayson gave me a present. I'm not sure what it is, exactly, but I know it's old and probably valuable. I wish now I had paid more attention when we studied ancient civs in school. At least it's small enough to sneak home no trouble. I'll put it on my desk when I get back and nobody else will know what it is, either. I could tell Tad it's a moon rock and he wouldn't know the difference. He couldn't find this place on a map. Kid never reads anything but the sport page. _

_The Lt. said all of the guys pick up "a few somethings" for souvenirs, and as long as it's pretty small it's alright. Not like the big vases and such they showed on telly. Leave the big stuff to the pros who know how to deal with them properly, he said. No use taking the risk and then not being able to sell the stuff. Looking at it, I feel a bit like Indiana Jones, although I didn't actually find the thing myself. I am not sure what to tell Maria about it. She's pretty smart and will know that I couldn't have legally bought it in a gift shop if it's real. I'll tell her it's a fake one of whatever it is. Hey, it could be, couldn't it?_

_It seems to me that a lot of people are here to get something out of this place. I'm just looking forward to getting the money. I don't think I can even put this on my resume. Too bad, because the experience would look good, for someone my age and still at university. But the longer I am here and the more I find out about what's going on, the less I want to be associated with this place. _


	4. Chapter 4

Ch. Four

Secrets

They sat in Lewis' gray Vauxhall a few blocks from the office. Hathaway smoked out of his passenger side window. "Now, you're going to explain what the hell you're talking about so I don't have to waste time trying to suss it out on me own." Lewis ordered.

"I'm sorry, sir. Guess I'm still sorting it out in my mind, so it's a bit hard to explain. I've had this …awful dream the past few nights." He described it briefly, keeping his voice steady by watching the city traffic instead of his partner's face. Hathaway ended with how he had awakened in terror each time, desperate for a mind-altering substance, and earned a low whistle from the inspector. "Yeah, that's a bad one. Right out of a horror movie."

The sergeant nodded nervously "Well, just now in the office, it occurred to me what it was about."

Lewis rearranged his features into a "being patient with slow-witted witness" expression. "So, are you going to tell me about that?" he asked.

"I saw that face!" Hathaway said in mock anger.

Lewis smiled briefly. "Right. I'm listening."

Hathaway flicked the cigarette butt away. "It was right after I quit seminary. I was in a rather bad way. Things were rather..…uncertain for me." He glanced at Lewis. "I didn't have any plans for my life. I withdrew from everyone—I didn't want to talk to anybody. I holed up in my room for days and just slept. I guess in psychological terms I was clinically depressed."

"Understandable. You had taken a big hit to the whatsit, the psyche."

Hathaway smiled. "Yeah, my whatsit was in bad shape. Well. I was feeling pretty low and despairing and after a couple of days of that, I did something stupid."

"Oh. I see." Lewis said, keeping his tone neutral. Hathaway leaned back, gazing up at the roof of the car so he wouldn't have to look at his boss.

"Yeah. Really stupid…. Sir, my mum doesn't know. Nobody else does, either."

"Uh huh."

"I don't want her to know."

"James, I'm not in the habit of gossiping with your mother about you. Or about anything else, for that matter."

Hathaway nodded. Lewis and his mother, Louise, had dated briefly, a horrible crime had entangled them all.* Since then there had been nothing between the two, but Hathaway had wanted to make sure. (*See WhyAye's wonderful story, _Human Nature_ for relevant details….)

"You're stalling, sergeant."

"I know I am." He cleared his throat. "As I said, I tried something stupid."

"It didn't work."

Hathaway paused. "No, it did not."

"I'm glad. Else I'd be talking to meself right now." He noticed that his partner was not willing or able to say the word "suicide" aloud. "I guess it wasn't much like what your friend Will did, then?" Lewis asked gently.

"No, nothing that dramatic. Where would I have gotten a gun at a seminary? Besides, I'm a more low-key kind of guy. It would have to be something quiet and tidy."

"So it was pills then."

"Yeah. I took most everything I could find in the house. But I guess it wasn't enough."

"Good."

"I washed all the pills down with some wine, and I must've passed out. Next day, I woke up on the floor beside the bed. The phone rang and I answered it. I had missed some appointment. I laughed at the person on the line and hung up. Then I ran to the bathroom and spent the rest of the day worshipping at the porcelain altar."

"No fun, but at least you were alive."

"Alive, but throwing up bits of my stomach lining. Not a pleasant experience."

"That sounds bloody awful. Did you get any medical help?"

"No. I should have done, but by the time I was feeling stable enough to engage with the outside world, I had recovered. Physically, that is."

"Bloody hell."

"I told my friends I had a stomach virus, and left it at that. I think I lost a few clothing sizes that week." He gave a sardonic chuckle.

Lewis knew Hathaway now wanted to get some distance from the painful revelation. But first, he had to make sure.

"Have you ever considered anything like that since then?" Lewis kept his voice calm and even.

"No, I haven't. For one thing, police work has taught me that every violent death, even the seemingly tidy ones, create a terrible mess for the people left behind."

"That is so. But if you ever think about trying….something stupid again, you will call someone?" He looked directly at his partner, one eyebrow raised.

Hathaway met his superior's gaze steadily. "If anything like that ever occurs to me again, I will remember that there are people around who can help."

Lewis let out his breath, reassured, and sat back against the car upholstery. "Good. Now what does this have to do with our murder case?"

"Our murder case." Hathaway cleared his throat, back in detective mode. "You know how nowadays everyone knows the warning signs that someone is thinking about suicide?"

"Giving away prized possessions, dropping hints, putting things in order, that sort of thing?" Lewis asked.

"Yeah, exactly. See, even you know." He ducked an imaginary blow. "Well, I didn't do that. I didn't leave any note, I didn't hint about it to anyone. I knew the warning signs and I made sure that I didn't do anything obvious. A trained psychiatrist might have been able to figure out something, but I was able to hide it from the average person."

"Okay, let me get this straight. Our eccentric writer friend did not leave any sign of having committed suicide, so that is evidence of suicide? Oh, I can't wait till you run that past Innocent. A locked room murder that is really a suicide. Tricked out to look like a locked room murder."

"I didn't say it was suicide. I'm saying it just felt wrong for a murder."

"New book deal. Gorgeous fee-ance. Promising future. No history of depression. No weapon in the room. What, besides the lack of any sign of suicide, leads you to think it may be a suicide?"

"I can't tell you right now. It was just that something did not feel right in there."

"Of course it didn't feel right in there! As I recall, there was a man with not much of a head lying on the floor right by me left foot."

"I mean besides that. The "_Secrets and Lies"_ movie. The exotic stuff on the shelves. Reading maths. Creating puzzles and games as a hobby. The locked room. The loud arguing and the shots. The dentist girlfriend. The Pakistani visitor." Hathaway frowned and shook his head. "It all adds up to something, and I don't think it was murder."

_My dad used to say that you can put up with anything if you know when it will end. I know when this will end. I have 36 more days here. But I don't know if I can stand it that long. The heat is worse than ever. Troy, the tank guy, told me that the gauge on his weapons monitor got up to 120 degrees F today. When the guys on patrol got back to our quarters their uniforms could stand up by themselves, they were so full of dried salt and sweat. _

_Last night it was so hot that I couldn't sleep. Three of my so-called mates left in the middle of the night and didn't come back for at least two hours. I won't name who because of what we found out the next day. During the night there had been some kind of disturbance and a local man had gotten shot. Afterwards, he was supposedly mutilated by the guys that shot him. _

_We were all called into a briefing meeting where these bigwigs told us not to talk to anyone about the incident. We looked at each other and shrugged-we didn't know any more about it than the rumors that we had heard. But back in the quarters, the three who had gone out in the night showed us some photos on their digital cameras. I had to go to the head and throw up. They laughed and called me a nancy, a pillow biter and a fagboy, but this time I didn't care. _


	5. Chapter 5

Ch. Five

At Hathaway's urging, the pair revisited the flat, still sealed pending the medical examiner's report. Hathaway took cell phone photos of Blethyn's toys and knickknacks, while Lewis ascertained that, yes, Blethyn indeed had a drawer full of toothpaste samples in his bathroom. No sutures.

Hathaway called Lewis' attention to an object on Blethyn's desk. Lewis frowned. "What's that, a paperweight?"

"If it is, it should be resting on a stack of papyrus. It looks like a Sumerian cuneiform."

"Oh, of course. I was just going to say that. Tiny toilet plungers pressed into clay, like."

Hathaway laughed and shook his head. "Priceless," he muttered.

Back in the office, Hathaway busied himself at his computer while Lewis re-examined the crime scene photos. "Look at this, sir." Hathaway pointed at the photo he had uploaded from his phone to the computer.

Lewis squinted at the monitor. "That's the paperweight with the scratches, the what d'you call it?"

"Clay tablet with cuneiform markings, sir. These things date back to 2400 BCE."

"Hmmm. Think it's real?"

"Well, I don't know about this one exactly, but it resembles pieces stolen and smuggled out of museums in Iraq. Remember those vases and stele fragments from Mesopotamia and Ur?"

"Oh, yeah. Lovely steles they make in Ur. Gave our Lyn a fantastic Mesopotamian cuneiform for her last birthday. She wears it on a chain around her neck. Very smart it is."

"Seriously, sir." Hathaway turned back to his monitor, typed a few keystrokes. "At first I figured it was fake, some tourist knockoff, but now I'm not so sure. Look at this one, from the Iraqi National Library. Entire collections from the Baghdad National Museum disappeared after the 2003 US invasion. Priceless artifacts, thousands of years old."

Lewis moved across the room to peer over his partner's shoulder. "So where did our guy get a real one?"he asked.

Hathaway grimaced and typed a few keystrokes. "Look here, a Swiss dealer was caught selling one on eBay, of all places. Bidding was around 400 dollars." The sergeant shook his head. "Incredible."

Lewis snorted. "Exactly. Why would anyone pay all that money for an ancient bit of clay?"

Hathaway rolled his eyes and sighed. "You do understand the meaning of the term 'priceless'? Sir. Interpol nicked another dealer in Macedonia for trafficking in looted Iraqi treasures."

"Okay, I know all this is bad, but it seems to be a bit off topic. Not to mention out of our purview. Even if it was a stolen cuneiform, our writer friend doesn't seem to have any connection to smuggling rings and that. 'Mikey never did nothing', remember? Besides, he was a geeky working class pup making his way in university in 2003. He wasn't out in the desert looting Iraqi museums. Last thing we need is for Innocent to see you surfing Middle East antiquities websites when we are supposed to be out investigating a murder."

"We don't _know _if he went to Iraq, though, do we, sir? British troops were involved, weren't they? And private contractors, too, from everywhere. I think we need to at least look into an Iraqi connection. Maybe our Mrs. Banbury thought she saw a Pakistani, but it was actually a guy from Iraq, come to get his country's treasure back."

"Then why didn't he take it with him?"

"Don't know, sir. We have to find him and ask him."

"Would you leave it lying on the shelf after killing a bloke to get it?"

"Maybe he was in a hurry." Hathaway shrugged, let his head roll back and stretched his long arms over his head.

"Tension and eyestrain," said Lewis. "That's what comes from staring at computers. That, and information overload."

Hathaway massaged his temples. "Well, I would like to know if it is the real thing. Then we may have a motive."

"So you think it may be murder after all?" Lewis asked.

"We must needs follow wherever the clues lead us, sir. Like Theseus following the string to escape the maze of the Minotaur."

Lewis glared at the narrow back of his sergeant, who had returned to his monitor. "Sometimes I think you do that to me on purpose," he snapped.

Hathaway smirked. "Speaking of classical references, sir, maybe we should find someone who can evaluate this cuneiform." He glanced up at a skeptical Lewis. "Or… I could go do that and you could pursue….what you think is more relevant. Sir."

After some discussion, they agreed to consult comparative religion expert Hamid Jassim. For one, he was an Iraqi national and would probably have contacts in the immigrant community. For another, he might be able to authenticate the Sumerian artifact for them.

The two detectives were already acquainted with Professor Jassim—he had once been a suspect in another murder investigation. He had known the young woman who had been killed, and a decorative mirror belonging to him had been used as the murder weapon. However, he was eventually cleared of any wrongdoing, other than withholding pertinent information from the police.

Professor Jassim welcomed the men to his office and was much as they remembered him from a few years before: loquacious, suave, and cosmopolitan. Lewis noticed with approval that the professor had given up the battle against hair loss, abandoning his comb-over for a much more dignified short cut.

On the wall instead of the missing mirror, there was now a large framed map of ancient Baghdad. Hathaway noted that the map dated from the year 850 AD. The professor invited the policemen to sit and offered tea, which they accepted.

"From Yemen," he said, apologetically. "I'm afraid I've run out of my custom blend from home."

Hathaway inclined his head toward the map. "Beautiful example of medieval cartography, sir."

Professor Jassim smiled. "Indeed, from the Abassid Caliphate, when Iraq was the cultural center of the Muslim world."

Lewis groaned, "Culture and that's all well and good, but why did they have to go and invent algebra?" He scowled over his tea in mock anger. "Those overachievers ruined me life when I was 14."

Jassim laughed good-naturedly and sat back, asking, "So what's this valuable artifact you wished me to see?" Hathaway displayed the cuneiform image on his cell phone and explained where they had first seen it.

The visit had been productive beyond the detectives' imaginings. The tea, despite its non-Iraqi origins, had been perfectly acceptable. Jassim suspected that the cuneiform was probably authentic and, if so, definitely stolen. "I'm anxious to see that our precious historical treasure is returned to Iraq, once officially evaluated," he had asserted.

He had also agreed to arrange an introduction with the director of a local Iraqi youth program. "If a member of our community is in trouble, we want to know about it," he explained. Professor Jassim had evidently forgiven the detectives for marching him out of the building in handcuffs at their last meeting.

_It's hard to focus on my work these days. At first it was enjoyable—the decoding and transcription was way more interesting than classes, and was a lot like solving puzzles. It was distracting and made the rest bearable. The heat, the tension, the constant noise, the explosions and gunfire, the low-class behavior and tasteless jokes of my workmates._

_I was here for the work, and of course, the money. Every week, $1600 US taxfree was magically accumulating in my bank account. I was checking online fairly often and there is was, adding up to a nice nest egg for me and Maria. I was going to live on it while putting my book draft together and we would be able to get married. _

_What was I saying? Oh yeah, about how hard is to concentrate. One of the lads gave me some pills when I said I was nervous because of the explosions. Valium, I think they were. I took them. I never was much for drugs and all back home and I only drank once in a while, socially. But the pills did make me feel better. Some of the guys here take all sorts of pills and say that's how they cope with life. Perhaps a temporary necessity._


	6. Chapter 6

Ch Six

Malik

The AIAF, or "Anglo-Iraqi Assistance Foundation," as the professor translated, was located in a small building between a Middle Eastern grocery and an electronics store. Inside they met Ms. Huda Nawal, an outspoken young social worker with a middle class British accent.

Ms. Nawal wore the traditional white hijab scarf, but was otherwise attired in the classic uniform of modern Western civilization: blue jeans, logo T-shirt and white trainers. She was petite and a bit hyperactive; her restless black eyes and sharp features made Lewis think of an intelligent little bird. Professor Jassim excused himself, pausing briefly to chat in Arabic with a group of teenagers playing video games before taking his leave.

Lewis raised a curious eyebrow after the professor and Ms. Nawal laughed. "Dr. Jassim never misses an opportunity to explain why they should be working or studying instead of wasting their time playing violent computer games. The kids think he is an old fart."

Hathaway smiled and Lewis nodded. "I'm an even older fart, then. I think all of us over a certain age agree with him. But unfortunately, we're here about real life violence, not the video kind."

They showed their warrant cards and Ms. Nawal pursed her lips. She ushered the two detectives into her tiny office, made even smaller by a table, four chairs, several potted houseplants and an overloaded bookshelf crammed inside.

They sat at the table, squeezing in with difficulty. Hathaway, his elongated frame folded nearly double, began what they thought would be a difficult, lengthy process. "Ma'am, we're trying to locate a young Middle Eastern man as a possible witness in a murder investigation."

To their complete surprise, the woman said, "If this is about that writer who was killed a few days ago, then yes, I think I know who you're looking for."

Lewis reacted first. "You know him? How?"

"He's one of our volunteer interpreters-Malik Hassan. He's been wanting to talk to the police. But he was afraid he would be accused of killing that man. I can assure you, he definitely didn't do it."

By the time they left the center, 30 minutes later, the two detectives had obtained not only the name and address of their "person of interest" but a brief overview of the young man's life and personality as well. He lived with an uncle, had emigrated from Iraq after his family was killed, and was currently unemployed but studying computers.

His English was quite good, and he worked as an interpreter for the less fluent among the Arabic-speaking population of greater Oxford. The AIAF center could not afford to give Malik a regular salary, but did pay for his bus or cab fare and reimburse his lunch expenses on the days he did interpreting.

This work, Ms. Nawal explained, often involved assisting elderly immigrants with such mundane errands as shopping, paying bills, and negotiating the bureaucratic intricacies of the British social services.

"You should see Malik with our senior citizens—he is so patient and gentle." She smiled. "Some of the older women would rather he accompany them to their doctors' appointments instead of their own family members. They quite adore him. You could not possibly think him guilty of any violence if you met him."

They easily located the low-rent housing estate where Malik Hassan lived. He seemed resigned, rather than surprised to see the two police detectives standing in the doorway. Malik Abdul Hassan was in his early twenties, short, bespectacled and dark-skinned. His black hair, cropped close like Hathaway's, revealed ears that stuck out and emphasized a rather prominent nose. He smiled shyly, showing slightly crooked teeth under a sparse moustache.

No Omar Sharif here, thought Lewis, wondering if the young man had ever even heard of the handsome Lebanese actor. Stylishly baggy clothes hung scarecrow-like on his thin frame. He was at home alone- his younger cousins were at school and his uncle and aunt were out working, he told them.

"They are both cleaners at a large hotel," he explained. "I must call them and arrange for someone to be home when my cousins get out of school."

Interview Room #4 was pleasant and modern, newly furnished and recently painted a rather cheerful shade of blue. It boasted an actual window into the hallway instead of mirrored two-way glass. Witnesses and "persons of interest" were supposedly more forthcoming if _interviewed_—a less intimidating verb than _interrogated_—in environments that were more upbeat than rooms reserved for "suspects". At least that is was the latest thinking from the experts.

But it was still too bare, too bleak a place for friendly conversation. Hathaway had once remarked to Lewis that Saint Francis of Assisi would look like a thug if seated across a table from a police officer in a small room.

Lewis peeked through the window. No Catholic saints in residence today, unless you counted Hathaway, leaning against the opposite wall. Malik Hassan sat at the table, his baseball cap on the table in front of him. The inspector sighed and entered the room. Sgt. Hathaway looked up and met Lewis' eyes with barely concealed excitement—at last they had someone to question.

The tape was running. "This session is with Malik Abdul Hassan. He is 24 years old, born in Iraq. He has resided in this country for three years. Mr. Hassan, Inspector Lewis is going to ask you some questions as well."

"Mr. Hassan understands the procedure here?"

"Yes, and he has been cautioned, sir."

Lewis nodded his approval. Malik Hassan was, understandably, under stress at being questioned by police. His right leg bounced unconsciously under the table. A nervous forefinger pushed at the baseball cap, while his dark eyes, seemingly on loan from someone much older, flicked around the small room.

Hathaway was already in the process of questioning the youth. "We are discussing Mr. Hassan's movements on the night of Mr. Michael Blethyn's death. You stated that you went to Mr. Blethyn's flat around 7:30 on the evening of July 17th."

"I was there that night, yes. Just to talk." His voice was soft, slightly accented and unexpectedly high-pitched.

"What did you talk about? Were you friends?" Hathaway asked casually.

"No, we were not friends. We could never have been friends."

"So, you were enemies, then?" Hathaway followed up.

"I would not say that because I did not know the man very well. But I did not like him."

"You'd met him before?" Lewis asked.

"Yes, I had visited him several times." The young Iraqi stared at the table.

The inspector continued, "Why did you visit Mr. Blethyn if, as you say, you were not friends?"

The youth shifted in his chair. "I do not want to say."

Hathaway glanced at Lewis, who raised his eyebrows slightly—no doubt they were going to uncover some illicit transaction involving drugs or sex.

Hathaway took over again. "You do realize that we are investigating the possible murder of Mr. Blethyn?" The young man nodded. "And that withholding information regarding this matter could in itself constitute a criminal act?"

"I didn't kill him. On tv they said that he was shot in the face. I could never have done such a thing. I have seen… in my country I saw people shot." He shook his head and looked directly at Hathaway. "I could never have done such a thing," he repeated, the pain of memory showing plainly in his eyes.

Lewis continued. "You were there that night, however. You say you weren't his friend. What were you there for, if not to do him harm?"

Hassan pressed his lips together. "To talk about a… private matter," he said reluctantly.

_They asked us if we wanted to extend our contracts or re-up or whatever the bloody hell they call it. I know I should because a) the money is so good and b) the rest of the team all wants to stay longer. These guys are my mates now, I've gotten pretty tight with my buddies as the Americans say._

_Things have changed since…well, it's different when you find yourself in a situation where you almost die and someone you never met until a few months ago saves your life. I guess you can get friendly with a bloke you couldn't stand before. Amazing how things change. A few weeks ago I hardly was able to have a conversation with these guys, especially the Americans. They seemed so low-class and coarse. I'm from the working class myself, but these guys were too much. _

_Then, one evening coming back to the base, we ran into our first IED. The vehicle flipped over and was on fire. I just remember a lot of noise and shouting and smoke and even more heat than the usual. Suddenly two guys were there, cranking up that vehicle and dragging me to safety, all in a hail of sniper fire. _

_They had on body armor, but when those bullets start flying, guys can get dead real quick no matter what they have on. I ended up with some minor first degree burns on my hands and earned a few days away from the computer. Sgt. Luis Polanco and Capt. Jerry Williams risked getting their arses shot off for me. The next day I went out with them drinking. And we are friends now. Real friends. _


	7. Chapter 7

Ch Seven

Mari

Gradually, it came out, and it was not at all what they expected. The young immigrant had been only 16 in 2003 when US forces invaded Iraq. Shortly thereafter, a group of foreign contract workers, Americans and British, broke into his home and grabbed his twin sister, Mari Abdullah.

"They said she was a prostitute who had agreed to….be with them if they came to her house." He looked up at the two men, anguished. "It was not true! She had never seen those men before and she was not, was never…."

"It's okay. Go on." Lewis' voice was low and sympathetic.

"My father was not at home, and my older brother was out working. Mother was so frightened-she couldn't move. The men pushed me and my mother out of the house. They struck my mother and I tried to stop them.

I begged them to please leave my family alone. They beat and kicked me. I could hear Mari inside, screaming so loudly. Then, all was quiet. Except now I could hear my mother praying."

Hathaway cleared his throat softly. "We are very sorry about this incident, Malik, but we need to get back to why you visited Mr. Blethyn."

His entire demeanor changed. One moment he was the frightened youngster revisiting the horror of his family's home invasion and his sister's assault. Next moment he was a grown man again, angry and unafraid.

"He was one of them!" he hissed. "Your famous writer was one of the men who attacked my family! That is why I went to his home."

Lewis and Hathaway stared at him, appalled. Hathaway recovered his voice first. "It would appear that you had a very strong motive to kill Mr. Blethyn, then."

"I told you already that I didn't kill him. I only went to talk to him!"

Lewis decided that a short break was in order. He stuck his head out and called a couple of constables to escort their suspect to the men's room and to get him something to drink. Then he and Hathaway retired to their office for a hasty consultation.

"Bloody hell!" Lewis blew out his breath and sank into his chair. "At least we're getting somewhere. We are getting somewhere, right?"

Hathaway shrugged. "Think he's telling the truth, sir?"

"If he's lying, he's crazy. He's burying himself in motive and opportunity." The inspector shook his head. "It's a mess either way."

Hathaway handed his superior a mug. Lewis set the tea down on his desk and looked dissatisfied. He asked, "Imagine what the Muslim community will do if we have to charge him with murder for avenging his sister's honor?"

"We can't very well let him walk out of here, sir. Not after dropping that story in our laps." The sergeant frowned. "But one piece of physical evidence is in his favor-the cuneiform. The first suggestion of a link between Blethyn and Iraq."

"You're right there. So, are we ready to get down to the real deal, as the Americans would say? Turn up the pressure a bit?"

"Speaking of pressure," Hathaway muttered, strolling briskly to the whiteboard and seizing a marker. Seconds later CSI Innocent swept in.

"What's this about a suspect all but confessing to the Blethyn murder? Lewis?" She was trying, unsuccessfully, not to look pleased.

"Actually, ma'am, all we have is a suspect who says he knew the victim and was in his flat on the night in question. He flatly denies having killed Blethyn."

Lewis glanced over at Hathaway busily scribbling on the whiteboard. "Wanker," he thought.

"Of course he denies it! Your job is to find the proof; what else are detectives for?" She threw up her hands in exasperation.

On their way back to Interview Room #4, Lewis felt like needling his sergeant, perhaps relieve the tension a bit before resuming their questioning.

"You didn't give our superintendent a dissertation on the roles and purposes of the various members of the crime management team, James? Why not? Wasn't she asking for it?"

"Sir, I was fully occupied with updating our board."

"Admit it. You just don't have the nerve to take on the boss."

"You're absolutely right, sir. I prefer to keep my gonads firmly attached to my body."

Inspector Lewis hoped that he had composed his features into a sufficiently serious expression as they re-entered the room.


	8. Chapter 8

Ch Eight

Iraq

Hathaway turned on the tape.

"Alright, Malik. Can you tell us exactly what happened between you and Mr. Blethyn on the evening of the 17th?"

"I already told you it was a private matter and has nothing to do with however he was killed."

"Give us the information so we can make that determination," said Hathaway in a calm voice.

The young man paused, took a sip from a can of orange Fanta and then seemed to come to a decision. "I didn't know he lived here in Oxford until I saw him on tv talking about his book. I was stunned."

"Stunned meaning surprised or stunned meaning angry?" Hathaway asked.

"Both. I vowed there and then to track him down and demand a public confession and apology for what he had done to my sister."

Lewis had a thought. "You said earlier that you had interacted with him several times. How did you contact him?"

"First, I found his email address from a website and sent him a message. I said I knew him in Iraq and wanted to meet. He sent me a message with his phone number. I called him and when he heard my voice, he hung up."

"I think my accent alarmed him. At first he must have thought that I was one of his buddies wanting to reminisce about what fun they had in that stupid desert country." He drank more orange pop.

"So I went to one of his book signings. I got in line with his fans and when I got close enough, I handed him a note. He took it perhaps thinking that I wanted his autograph."

"Very resourceful. What did it say?" prompted Hathaway.

"What I just told you. I said who I was and that I wanted a confession and an apology."

Hathaway asked, "How did Mr. Blethyn react?"

"He read it and at first looked up at me with such anger that I stepped back. Then, he smiled and said, 'Sorry, I'm sure you have a very compelling tale, but I really haven't the time now.' He pretended that I had asked him for help with getting published." He shook his head, remembering.

"He wrote something on the paper and handed it back to me, then turned to the next person in line. I left the table and read what he had written across my note. It said, 'Fuck off stalking me, or I will have you arrested.'"

Lewis leaned forward, giving Hathaway a breather. "So far, you emailed him, called him, saw him at a public event and gave him a message. Is that right?"

"Yes, I think so."

"About when was this going on?"

"Last spring. When his book came out."

"What was your state of mind at this point? Were you angry or frustrated?"

"I—I did not know what to do next. I was right and he was wrong. But he was going to have me arrested! I have been in this country long enough to know whose word would be taken as truth."

He looked up at the older man. "A famous British author, a wealthy man, a white man, against an immigrant, a poor brown man. Who would take the word of a Muslim, a terrorist, a raghead, a Paki. Yes, I have been called all those things. But I thought of Mari and of my family."

"And I decided to follow the advice of the Holy Quran. In Surah 2:153 it states: "_Indeed Allah is with those who persevere in adversity." _I would go to his home and confront him. If he had me arrested, so be it. I would tell him my truth and let Allah's will be done."

"Even if he killed me, then I would be with Mari and the rest of my family in paradise."

"In paradise? You mean they're dead?" asked Lewis

"Oh, yes. They're dead. I held Mari in my arms as she bled to death. After those dogs had finished with her."

Lewis caught his breath. He had a sudden vision of his own daughter dying in his arms, after, god, no. ….He shook himself mentally. Get a hold, ya stupid sod. Be a copper.

But Hathaway beat him to it. He asked quietly, "Malik, what happened to the rest of your family?"

"My mother never got over Mari's death. Her only daughter's murder. Her gang rape. She….stopped eating. She had diabetes. She went into a coma and died. She went to be with Mari. My older brother disappeared. He went to work one day and never returned."

"My father was killed in a car bomb at the market. Who knows if it was a Sunni or Shia terrorist. Like most Iraqis, my family is Shia, but it doesn't matter. At any rate, they're all gone now. All within a year of Mari's death. Like a curse on our family. All except me."

"I tried to survive alone, but life became very difficult for me. I had an uncle here. He sent for me and I came to England as a refugee."

"Malik. Do you need a break?" asked Lewis.

"No. I want to tell my story."

He looked down and then composed himself again.

"I found Michael Blethyn's home."

Hathaway asked,"How?"

"Simple, I followed him. He had accused me of stalking him. So I did. I waited outside his house and confronted him when he came out one morning. I told him that he had raped and killed my sister in Iraq."

"He denied even being in Iraq, said I had the wrong person. He threatened me again with arrest. I left. I returned a few days later and a few days after that. On my last visit, the evening of July 17th, he had been drinking alcohol.

He allowed me into the house, he said to keep me from making another scene in the street. He said he had not known that 'the girl' had died. He called my sister a prostitute, told me she had been much older than 14."

The young Iraqi looked up at the two men, his eyes glittering with emotion. "Know what he did then? He offered money! Money! The dirty swine."

"He said that the men in our family probably killed her because she was not a virgin. My twin sister. That is when I…I lost my temper and struck at him. We struggled and tore up the room. I believe that I could have killed him—I was that angry. But I didn't.

I have seen enough death and killing. We stopped fighting and shouting. He told me that he had been only 23, the same age as me now, when he took a short-term contract job in Iraq. He just wanted to earn some money so he could write. He had never intended to get involved with the locals."

"That's what he called it—getting involved with the locals. But the men he was with, they called him unmanly names and told him that he had to prove that he was a real man and go with them to find women. I asked him if he would admit to having hurt my sister in Iraq. He said no, it would ruin his life."

"I noticed the small clay tablet on his desk. It was Iraqi, stolen from the national museum. It was proof that he was in Iraq, or had connections there. I thought about taking it but I didn't."

"He asked me what I wanted if not money. I repeated that I wanted a public confession and apology. It was for Mari. He refused. I said I would tell everyone what he had done. He ordered me to get out."

Hathaway made himself ask, "How do we know you are telling us the truth about what happened that night? Mr. Blethyn is not here to defend himself."

"Neither is my sister. Thanks to Mr. Blethyn and his friends."

"But I didn't kill him. The Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, taught that _"You shall not kill any person - for GOD has made life sacred_". Mr. Blethyn's death won't bring Mari back. Won't bring my family back either. I will mourn them forever." Malik Hassan's eyes welled up with tears. He suddenly looked very young and alone.

"We Shia say we are experts at mourning, just like the Jews say they are experts at suffering. We mourn the death of Hussein ibn Ali, peace be upon him, the Holy Prophet's grandson. Do you know when Hussein was martyred at Karbala?"

Lewis shook his head. Hathaway said, "It was in 752 AD." Malik nodded. "Every year we mourn, weep, scourge ourselves in our grief, as if it had happened yesterday. It is called the ritual of Ashura. Every year we do this to remember our fallen brother Hussein. We don't forget. We bleed for him. We bleed for all our people."

"Now, when I observe Ashura, I remember Mari. I bleed for my family."The young man voice choked off. He was weeping freely now.

Lewis blinked back a bit of moisture from his own eyes and looked over at Hathaway.

His hands were folded on the table, blonde head slightly bowed—was he praying? Lewis wondered how many times a day his sergeant prayed. Hathaway lifted his head, stood up and handed Malik a box of tissues. The young man took the box, whispering his thanks.

Hathaway nodded, then said, "Clarify something for me, Malik. You stated several times that you didn't kill Mr. Blethyn. You quoted from a Quranic Sura that forbid killing. But you did not give the complete verse, did you? '_You shall not kill any person, for god has made life sacred, except in the course of justice.'_"

Malik stared at the sergeant. "Are you a Muslim, sir?" he asked in wonder, obviously appreciating the distraction.

"No, but I've read the Quran," Hathaway replied.

"In his spare time," Lewis added. Then to himself, bloody hell—is there anything the Boy Wonder doesn't know?

"There's more about killing to avenge an injustice, isn't there?"

"Yes, there is," said the youth, calm and again in control. "The Surah is 17, verse 33. It continues: _'If one is killed unjustly, then we give his heir authority to enforce justice. Thus, he shall not exceed the limits in avenging the murder; he will be helped._'"

"Do you agree, Malik? That a family member is entitled to avenge a relative's murder?"

Lewis was impressed with Hathaway's smooth incorporation of the religious text into the questioning. Maybe a theology background wasn't completely useless for a policeman after all.

"I respect the British government. You may not believe me, but I do. Iraq was originally set up to be secular, without an official religion-unlike this country."

Lewis raised an eyebrow at his sergeant and said, "He's got a point."

The young man smiled and continued. "Besides, the Surah says you may enforce _justice_. That's all I wanted. I didn't kill him, although he deserved to die. I've seen enough killing to last 10 lifetimes." He slumped back in his chair, emotionally drained.

Lewis knew that Malik was fading-they would not be able to get much more from him. Legally, they could not question him for longer than six hours and it had already been four. They would have to bring charges and detain him, or release him from custody and let him walk out the door. He repeated an earlier question.

"Refresh our memories, Malik. What time did you arrive at the flat?"

"It was about 7:30, still very light outside."

"And when did you leave the flat that night?"

"It was just getting dark, I think around 8:30. I was not there longer than an hour, of that I am sure."

"Did you see anyone else around the house during that time?"

"Only the old woman next door, pretending to work in her garden. I'm afraid I wasn't very polite to her."

Quiet descended. Lewis cleared his throat. "Are we done here, then, sergeant?"

Hathaway looked up, his expression bland and unreadable. "I think so, sir," he said, switching off the recorder. The two police detectives stood.

Malik looked hopeful."Am I free to leave now?"


	9. Chapter 9

**Thanks for the reviews. There will be around three more chapters and we will wrap this puppy up. -doctorjay**

Ch. Nine

Locked

Standing in CSI Innocent's office, the two detectives lodged their protest. Lewis began, trying to remain calm. "Ma'am. We don't think Malik's guilty. I realize that the circumstantial evidence is against him, but we spent several hours talking with him. He just doesn't seem to be the man we're looking for."

Innocent was firm. "Might I remind you two that establishing guilt is not our job—we gather and present the evidence. The rest is for the courts to decide."

"Perhaps we can release him on his own recognizance." Hathaway suggested. "We know where he lives. We know where he works as a volunteer. We are in contact with the social worker who knows him well and is a responsible community leader."

Lewis leaned forward, intent on his supervisor's face. "Besides all that, he has no money and nowhere to go. His immigration status as a refugee depends on him remaining in England. It's not as if he can hop a plane from London and apply for refugee status somewhere else."

The dark-haired woman shook her head, mouth pulled down in disagreement. "Of course we have to charge Malik Hassan. After questioning, he remains our prime candidate for this crime." She ticked off points on her fingers."He tracked the victim down and harassed him, both at his place of business and home. He freely confessed to having a powerful and understandable motive- the assault and death of his sister. He engaged in an argument and violent struggle with the victim near the estimated time of death. A person answering his description was placed at the scene by an eyewitness. And there is nobody else anywhere close to being a suspect."

"He was provoked and he admits to that. But he's no violent fanatic seeking revenge. He's just a troubled kid who has been through some very rough times." Lewis' frustration was evident.

"That may be so. But we are in no position to release him in light of the evidence against him. It could have been an accident, perhaps self-defense. Maybe it was a case of manslaughter instead of murder, but one fact remains clear. Malik Hassan was the last person to see Michael Blethyn alive. Mr. Hassan also withheld information relevant to a murder investigation and remained at large until located by police." Innocent raised a querulous eyebrow. "Why must you two make this more complicated than it is?"

Hathaway said, "Because, ma'am, it is complicated. For one thing, there's the missing murder weapon, ma'am. His residence has been thoroughly searched. Nothing. No sign of him having access to any weapons. And the elderly neighbor saw him leave _before_ she heard the gunshots."

Innocent's gaze was stony. "The neighbor is 80 years old—how sure can she be of her facts?" "You'd have to meet Mrs. Banbury, ma'am," Lewis said ruefully. "She is an amazingly direct and observant lady." He shuddered slightly. Hathaway was intent on the tabloid paper on the desk in front of them, and was careful not to look at his governor. The front page of the paper showed a publicity photo of Michael Blethyn, and a headline screamed "Police search for suspects in death of science writer."

The chief super pushed the paper forward towards the detectives. "You see? The papers and tv are already full of 'the murderous attack on a local writer with a promising career'. Interviews with the family, photos of the beautiful girlfriend. The public wants to know what we are doing about this case. Do you know what the media would do with us if they find out we had a suspect with this much evidence against him? Do you have any idea how it would look if we released him now? Mr. Hassan needs to be under arrest, safely tucked away in a cell. His family should be advised to arrange for a solicitor to represent him. " She folded her hands on the desk and with that, the conversation was over.

Lewis yawned. Another late night, followed by an early morning. They examined the crime scene photos. Again. "There has to be something we've missed. Notice any differences?" He slid the two sets of pictures over to Hathaway, who looked from the first stack to the other, bleary-eyed. "No dead bloke on the carpet?" He shrugged.

Lewis scowled, and made a growling noise in his throat. The sergeant continued. "The window was open, wasn't it?" Lewis nodded. "Yeah. It was a hot night- I remember hearing the street noises."

Hatchway pointed at a photo. "See, the window was wide open when the first police arrived on the scene."

"Yeah, and he had those burglar bars on. Nobody got in or out that way."

"But could anything else get out, like the gun that killed him? Could someone, say Mrs. Banbury or a mysterious Mr. X have found the body and for some unknown reason, disposed of the gun before the police arrived?"Hathaway paced the room.

Lewis shook his head. "Dropped it out the window? We looked. No gun anywhere near the building. No gun in the rubbish tips in the area, under the shrubberies, on the window ledges. No gun."

Hathaway stopped pacing."The door was locked, remember? It had to be broken in. Blethyn must have locked it after Malik left to keep him out. Makes sense he didn't want the kid coming back to bother him again. So who got in to shoot him and how?"

They looked at the white board. Lewis rubbed his eyes. "Okay, let's go over the timing again. Malik shows up at 7:30. They talk. They argue. They fight. He leaves by 8:30."

Hathaway continued. "The old girl hears the arguing. She sees Malik leave. Then she hears gunshots. She calls the police at about nine. Time of death between 8:30 and 9."

"Wait a minute," Lewis interrupted. "Let's look at her statement again. It says she heard 'a row. Then bang bang bang, just like on tv only louder.' Three shots. Where did we find the other bullets?"

"Report says in the floor near the body."

"Right. Okay. One shot killed Blethyn. Presumably the third. Why shoot twice into the floor first? Who's that bad a shot? Needs three tries to hit a point blank target?"

"Perhaps we have a very short-sighted and inexperienced murderer, sir." They met each other's eyes, remembering Malik Hassan removing his glasses to wipe his eyes with tissues after his emotional story. Hathaway went on. "Or maybe there was a struggle over the gun. It went off a few times before killing the victim."

The inspector sat slumped, his face resting in his hands. "Yeah," he mumbled, "but there wasn't anyone else there! Blethyn would have had to be struggling over the gun with himself."

"Okay suppose Mikey-who-never-did-nothing is suffering from suicidal guilt over the …what happened in Iraq." The sergeant pantomimed, forming his fingers into a gun. "He fires some shots into the floor and then shoots himself in the head to make it look like Malik had done it. That accounts for the residue on both of his hands."

"And then his ghost gets up and neatly disposes of the weapon. C'mon, James, that's no good."

"It's a puzzle, sir. A classic locked room puzzle."

"Morse liked puzzles. I hate puzzles."


	10. Chapter 10

Ten

Angles

"Hold up a minute. Morse liked puzzles. Michael Blethyn liked puzzles." Lewis was frowning as he spoke, slowly and thoughtfully.

"Yeah, so?" Hathaway mimicked his governor's remarks of a few days earlier.

"How far from the place where the body lay to the window, James?"

"Hmmm. About 7 feet I suppose. I'd have to get the diagrams to be exact. Why-?" The sergeant looked at his inspector with a slight expression of worry.

"James, that's it!"Lewis smacked his hand on the desk top. "Remember? He liked _making up puzzles_. He enjoyed playing billiards, his mother said. He liked games and puzzles. It's a locked room puzzle, you said."

Suddenly, Hathaway was breathless, starting to feel lightheaded. "I think I see what you're getting at, sir. It's maths. Geometry. Angles. Malik was telling the truth. He didn't kill Michael Blethyn."

Lewis was also on his feet, energized. "I can visualize it, but I couldn't do the calculations or whatever. I was never very good at billiards and that. Can you see how it was done?"

"Yes, sir. We need to go back to the flat. The gun is there, somewhere….. She's a dentist and her office was robbed. Set theory. You see, now it all fits. The stuff stolen makes sense now." The young sergeant grabbed a stack of notepapers from his desk and flung them into the air, whirling around like a dervish among the sheets as they drifted to the floor.

At this last, Lewis frowned in concern. "Do you need to lie down, sergeant?"

"Maybe later. Now we have to find the gun and figure out this guy's last puzzle."

It was a bright sunny day, almost high noon by the time they arrived at the writer's flat. They walked around the building and looked up at the trees.

"Nothing seems to be left on the leaves, James."

"Must have already dissolved. Pretty good trick, sir."

Lewis squinted up at the trees, shading his eyes from the sun. "Wonder how far something like a gun could go."He looked around the wooded park-like area behind Blethyn's building.

Hathaway shrugged."Depends on the size of the gun, wouldn't it? A small weapon would fly pretty far, up to a point."

"Well, Laura said it was a .357 Magnum—that's a pretty big gun."

They searched the grounds, tracking ever larger circles starting from just under the dead man's window. It was Inspector Lewis who spotted it, lodged high in a clump of shrubbery some 50 yards from the house. After securing the area around the hedge, Lewis made the call to get an evidence team.

"Look at how high up it is—no wonder we couldn't find it before," the inspector said, pointing. "We would have had to use a helicopter to see it."

Hathaway clapped his partner on the shoulder. "Congratulations, sir," he said, smiling. "There may be hope for you after all."

Lewis rolled his eyes, but he was elated. The two detectives' had found the proof they needed- and possibly enough evidence to free Malik.

A day later, once again in their superior's office, the rather disheveled-looking investigative team were barely able to contain their excitement as they tried to explain.

"See, the position of the weapon supports our speculation about the mysterious death— it was too far away to have been dropped or even thrown from the barred window." Hathaway looked at Lewis, who continued.

"Our previous searches had missed it because it was too high up—over twelve feet from the ground. And a murderer would have been taking quite a chance, running all the way out to that to that dense hedge behind the flat, and throwing the gun up there. It'd be tricky doing that without being spotted by the police who arrived the night of Blethyns's death."

Innocent looked at them as if they had both sprouted horns.

"So, let me get this straight. You are telling me that the victim shot himself and then threw the gun out of the window _after_ he was dead?"

"Yes ma'am," said Hathaway. "As strange as it seems, he did."

"Uhm hum. I hope this gets better."

Lewis nodded. "It does. Because he was a puzzle expert, and a good billiards player, and understood angles and so on. He took a bit of geometry, added a bit of physics and the finishing touch, dental suture. The dissolving kind, so it would disappear after a few days."

Their boss still looked skeptical, her raised eyebrow saying, "Keep talking, boys."

Lewis took a breath and went on. "The night of the killing, Sergeant Hathaway noticed that the "_Secrets and Lies"_ film had been on the DVD player."

"Ma'am, I don't know if you remember that film, but there's a lot of yelling and fighting in it. The perfect background if you want it to sound like more than one person arguing."

She was beginning to look intrigued. "You're thinking Blethyn wanted to frame Malik?"

"It was a frame _and _a suicide, ma'am. Premeditated, for sure. It took time and patience to rig it all up. " Lewis replied.

"Can that really be done? Flinging a gun out of a window with dental suture?"

"Not only with dental suture. You could do it with postal string or dental floss or knitting wool or elastic bands tied together," said Hathaway, with just a touch too much enthusiasm.

"Sergeant Hathaway had us try it with all of them. The elastic bands shot the gun the farthest." At her widened eyes, the inspector hastened to reassure her. "We didn't use a real gun, ma'am. Just a facsimile, something of the approximate size, weight and shape. And we didn't do it in the office."

The Chief Super raised a curious eyebrow. The men spoke as though they had spent quite a bit of time during the past twenty-four hours in some undisclosed location playing, ah, _experimenting_ with the toy gun, ah, facsimile and different types of string. Innocent wondered when and where these experiments had taken place, and then decided that she really did not want to know. She imagined if they had been caught at it, the two of them would have pointed at each other, shouting in unison like a television comedy team, "He made me do it!"

Hathaway was speaking again and Innocent pulled her attention back from her bemused meanderings.

"But the suture worked well, and it is the only thing that would leave virtually no trace. Even before it dissolved, it would be practically invisible, especially at night. It looks almost exactly like a spider's web, hanging from a tree. "

He continued, "We think Blethyn used a strong tree branch to supply the needed tension. He bent it into the window, tied one end of the suture to it and the other to the gun. After he fired the gun and fell, the gun was ripped from his hand and flung out the window into the air. The force might have snapped the suture instantly."

"Or the gun could have fallen into the hedge later once the suture dissolved," Lewis suggested.

Innocent folded her hands on her desk. "Do you mean to tell me that the murder weapon might have been hanging from a tree in plain sight all this time, and the entire police force missed it?"

Lewis shrugged. "You recall, ma'am that at the time we were looking at a murder, not a suicide. We were not expecting to find the gun on the premises at all."

"I suppose that does not really matter now," Innocent said. "What a strange case. So our suspect may have been telling the truth after all. You realize that we still have to take the case to trial, but if this evidence introduces enough uncertainty, I doubt he will be convicted."

"We may never know what really happened that night. The evidence will be laid before the jury and justice will take its course. Our mandate, gentlemen, is to serve and protect the British public. And to uphold the law."

She raised a finger.

"British law. What Mr. Blethyn may or may not have done in a foreign country is not in any way our responsibility. As police officers, our job is done. Until your testimony is asked for at the trial, that is. Is there anything else, gentlemen?"

Lewis shook his head, relieved. "I don't think so, ma'am."

Hathaway's side of the office was cluttered with balls of string, boxes of elastic bands, packets of dental suture and skeins of colorful knitting wool.

"Looks like a jumble sale over here, James."

The sergeant, frowning, ignored the remark. "We may just end up looking incompetent, sir."

"I know. Convincing the Chief Super is only half the problem. If the public takes Malik's side, and we hope they will, we will be opening ourselves up for a lot of pain and hassle. The price we pay for being diligent. No good deed and all that." Lewis picked up several hanks of wool yarn and mounded them up into a pillow-like form on his desk.

"Kind of like whipping yourself to share someone else's suffering?" Hathaway tossed his partner another skein to add to the pile.

"Hmm." Lewis rested his head on the wooly pile and closed his eyes. "Never did get the point of that Ashura thing. Beating yourself bloody for no reason," he slurred.

"I guess that's the point, from a psychological point of view."

"Oh, spare me, James," said a voice muffled by yarn.

"No, really sir. If you can't fix something, if you have to accept a horrible reality that you can't change, you can at least have a public demonstration of how bad the thing was. Isn't that what we do when we revisit the awful details of a crime during a trial?"

Lewis thought about that for a moment, remembering a recent case where his young sergeant had had to testify in court to convict a suspect who had raped and murdered a child. Hathaway had actually found the little girl's body—what was left of it. He reminded himself that Hathaway was not the parent of a daughter, but he still felt the emotional impact of what had happened to Mari, Malik's sister. Lewis raised his head then and meeting the haunted eyes of his young sergeant, nodded slowly, dislodging a few hanks from the hill. "Maybe, James. Maybe it is at that."


	11. Chapter 11

Eleven

Encoded

A few days later, DS Hathaway was organizing his notes on the Blethyn case in preparation for his upcoming testimony when was summoned to the front desk and saw, to his surprise, Dr. Maria Coniff, DDS. At first glance, she seemed just as pretty as he remembered her, but then he noticed that the skillful makeup job didn't completely hide how tired and pale she really was. Her clothes hung on her tall frame as if she had lost weight.

"Sergeant, I would like to speak with you, if I may," she said in a strained voice. "Certainly. Step right this way." He escorted her to an empty interview room and they sat down. "You do realize that if this is related to what happened to Mr. Blethyn, it can't be kept confidential," he warned. She nodded slowly and then reached into her handbag. "About a week before Michael….died, he gave me this data stick. He said that I might want to try to figure it out. I looked at the files on my laptop at home, but everything was just gibberish. Random words, not a single coherent sentence."

Hathaway took the data stick with a slight frown, his ears pricking up at the term "random". So far, nothing in the case had been as random as it had first seemed, he thought. Dr. Coniff went on. "I figured that it was some of his writing that he had made into a puzzle and put it aside. When I asked him about it later, he just shook his head and changed the subject. But he got the strangest look on his face, like he was thinking about something very sad. I just forgot about it; I guess I thought we would have time to talk about it someday. Obviously, we never got the chance. For so many things, we never got the chance." She looked as if she were going to cry for a long moment, then got control of herself. She cleared her throat and said, "And now, after all that has happened, I think it might be important." Hathaway nodded. She looked so hopeful, still trying to make sense of, what to her, remained a completely senseless crime. He said, "I appreciate a good puzzle." She looked at him with a sad smile. "I thought you might—in some ways you remind me of Michael. Quiet, thoughtful, intelligent, but with a secret adventurous side. Am I right?"

She really was very attractive, the young sergeant thought, keeping his expression neutral as his heart rate picked up a bit. "Some might say so," he said, and it was his turn to clear his throat. He went on, all business once more. "Is there anything else you want to tell us?" The dentist shook her head. "No. Just…..please use your own judgment about whatever you find on those computer files. Michael wanted me to have them, but he knew that I was not very good at figuring out puzzles. Maybe he really didn't want me to know what was on them." _I want my memories of Michael to remain intact, so if there is anything unpleasant, don't tell me._ It hung in the air between them, unspoken, like an invisible thought bubble.

Hathaway rose to escort her out, meeting Inspector Lewis in the corridor. "Dr. Coniff." He greeted the dentist politely, but a bit stiffly, Hathaway noticed. "Inspector," she replied, then looked down, as if composing herself. "I'm sorry that when we first met, I was so…" Thoughtless? Cruel? Lewis silently considered her options and waited, not letting her off the hook. She looked at the older man, her eyes brimming with unshed tears. "I was not at my best and did not think about what I was saying. I understand that you do have some idea of what I am going through."

Lewis softened then, and touched her arm, meeting her gaze with an empathetic expression. "Let it go, lass," he said quietly. "I'm sure you have more important things pressing on your mind these days." Maria Coniff leaned forward and impulsively planted a quick kiss on the inspector's cheek. Then she was gone down the hall, leaving only the slight hint of expensive perfume in her wake.

Lewis, bemused, touched his cheek and looked at his sergeant, who was most definitely _not_ looking back at him. "Aye but she's a nice girl, and no mistake, right sergeant?" "Oh yes, quite nice." The two men headed back to their shared office space, Hathaway keeping his eyes aimed straight ahead of him.

"And you can just stop it."

"Stop what, sir?"

"You know what. Not looking at me face where she bussed me. And don't start that smirking thing you do behind me back, either."

"Sorry, sir. I'll do my best to suck back any sign of a smirk. Although it is a temptation, I will admit."

_I'm not sure what to do about Maria. We were pretty serious and had planned to become engaged. She's so beautiful, like a model and brilliant, too. Studying to be a dentist. I showed her photo to my mates here and well, the stuff they said would get censored if I was stupid enough to write it straight, I mean like decoded. My work is mostly level one or sometimes two. The insurgent blokes here, even the pretty bright ones, don't have the patience or persistence to go to level three codes. _

_But all the correspondence going out of here is censored, and I never know when someone with a higher clearance than I have will swoop in and inspect. So I always write my personal journal in level three code. A code of a code of a code. And I keep it on a separate data stick. Probably nobody would bother to worry about some silly personal writing by a college student hired on a summer private contract. But it's good practice for me. _

_Anyway, the guys said some raunchy things about Maria, but they meant it as a compliment. A compliment to me, actually. For a long while I didn't talk about her, and kept her photos under wraps. Even when they teased me about being a nancy boy. But one day when I was fed up with the stupid homo jokes, I pulled out her photo and told them all about her. They said stuff about what she must be able to do with a mouth like that and so forth. What did she see in me, since I don't look like much and don't have money. What special techniques must I use on her in bed to keep her hanging around the likes of me. Then they left me alone, and no more jokes about me being gay. Of course, I would never tell them that we were waiting to get married because she is a Catholic. All we ever did was kiss and fool around a bit. _

_But now things have changed. For the past few nights, I've gone out drinking and partying with my mates here. And last time we went out, we, well we ended up with some women. I say "women" but the oldest one was probably 17. It was the first time I've ever done anything like that. It felt so odd, doing that for the first time, with someone I didn't even know, after waiting for Maria. I would not have done anything like that at home. _

_And to not know anything about her, not even her name. I never really saw the young lady's face because it was dark and she kept her head scarf on the whole time. Afterwards she just got up, pulled on her skirt, took my money and left. One of the guys said, whatever happens in Iraq, stays in Iraq and we all laughed, although I didn't think it was funny or true. When I got back to the quarters, I had to take some pills to calm down, get rid of the sick feeling and go to sleep. I know it's partly because of the long distance. And the fact that we could get blown to kingdom come at any minute of the day or night. I didn't do things like this before. It's different now. It just is. _


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter Twelve

Decoding

DS Hathaway had a headache. He lay on his sofa, a cup of tea growing cold on the floor beside him. It had taken Hathaway several evenings working alone at home but he had finally managed to crack the code. The code had been a simple letter substitution, but had been made more complex by having been re-coded two more times. And he had read what was on the files Dr. Coniff had given him. He had read through the files twice. Once, just to see what was there. And then he read it a second time, taking notes until the pain behind his eyes drove him away from the computer screen to make himself a cuppa, and then to his sofa to think.

It was another piece of evidence suggesting that Blethyn had a connection to Iraq, either by having been there himself as a private contractor, or by having had an acquaintance who had been. And, if there was any truth to what was in the files, it bolstered the story told by Malik Hassan about what had happened to his sister.

He stared at his laptop, at the damning sentences. Black words on a white screen. Words describing the fear and the danger, the depression and the drugs, the camaraderie of combat and the intense desert heat. As the words continued, they began to recount behavior so shameful, so heinous that it had been difficult to read.

God, how horrible, Hathaway thought. How could anyone live with himself after having participated in something like that? The sergeant sat back, his heart rate speeding up. How indeed? What did it all mean, exactly? And, should he tell Inspector Lewis about it?

It was a story, perhaps only a piece of fiction, but perhaps not. It might be just a writer's journal, an experiment in writing the imaginary thoughts of a young man—a college student without real combat experience—trying to survive and function in a war zone.

But what if it wasn't completely fiction? What if it was relating actual events, a man's personal description of his own harrowing descent into Joseph Conrad's "heart of darkness", a physical, emotional and spiritual hell where the veneer of society and anything resembling the normal rules of human behavior are eroded away? Could this be the terrible secret Blethyn could not reveal to anyone, and finally, could not live with? Was this the nightmare that had driven Michael Blethyn to suicide when the murdered girl's brother began to haunt his days?

_I am a writer. I am still in school, but I know that my calling is to write, to communicate, to explain. I have always been good with words, even when the words stayed in my head and never made it onto paper. Words-and numbers- are easy. People are hard. Words and numbers stay where you put them and do what you want. Most of the time anyway. So, understandably, it is hard for me when the words don't come. _

_No fiction for me. I don't have the imagination to create people and situations and figure out what the characters might be thinking. I want to be a popular science writer, to explain how the world really works like my heroes: guys like Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan and Richard Dawkins. Or Stephen Hawking. Not that I'm a genius or anything, but chemistry and physics and computers and geometry always made sense. How things work and so on. _

_The words come so easily when I want them to. But not today. Today we lost one of our guys. Another IED and one of the Americans, a Puerto Rican bloke, did not make it. He saved my life a few weeks back and just took it in stride. And now he is dead and will go back to his island home, first in a bag and later in a box. He was my friend. I wish I could write some profound commentary about war and loss and death and hate and Luis Polanco. But I can't. I'm no poet. No words will come. _


	13. Chapter 13

Confession

Hathaway had not often thought of his work conflicts as needing the consolation of contrition or penance, but he needed some help with the decoded message from a dead writer. And he did not want to tell anyone official yet—he needed some advice form a relatively neutral source.

"Bless me Father, for I have sinned. It has been three weeks since my last confession."

Later, Hathaway stood outside the church sanctuary, having made his decision. He took out his cellphone and called Inspector Lewis. "I have something I think you need to see, sir."

It was several months before the Michael Blethyn murder was finally laid to rest. The case against Malik was found not proved, due to the two detectives' detailed testimony, a courtroom demonstration of how a suicide could have disposed of a weapon after shooting himself-and a verra canny white-haired elderly witness with twinkling blue eyes, and unforgettable blue language to match.

Malik presented his family's story, ironically, as part of the prosecution's attempt to establish motive. After the trial, reporters flocked to interview him; the public got to hear all the gory details and for a time, limited only by the British public's attention span for prurient stories, newspapers and tv commentators vied to explore the incident in the most detail.

The other culprits involved in the rape and murder of Mari Hassan were exposed by the publicity; although they could not be formally charged, they were roundly condemned in the Sunday supplements and editorials. Other Iraqi immigrants came forward to tell their stories and Malik became something of an advocate for his compatriots.

He even arranged, with the assistance of Professor Jassim, for the cuneiform from Blethyn's desk to be repatriated to the Baghdad Museum. The professor reported that Malik was being offered a book deal and there was discussion of a tv film about "one young man: his sad life and determined search for justice". Ironically, the company proposing the book deal was the same American firm that had been negotiating a contract with one Michael Blethyn. Malik's sense of justice was finally satisfied.

Blethyn's family became minor celebrities in their own right, and were profiled on a segment of a reality tv program. They used some of the money earned to by a new car, an new air conditioner and to have their yard attractively landscaped.

Former slacker son Tad Blethyn met Malik and accompanied him to a mosque to shock his mates. Tad then discovered a heretofore unknown facility for languages. He began to study Arabic and was seen volunteering with the refugees at the Iraqi community center. The center received a substantial donation from Anonymous, and was thus able to give Malik a paid position as community media liaison.

Dr. Maria Coniff refused all requests for interviews.

Lewis' flat: a quiet evening found the two brothers-in-arms sitting on the sofa in the semi-dark, sharing silence and beer.

"People and their guilty secrets," Lewis muttered finally. "We all have them, but there are some that just can't stay buried. I guess one way to judge people is by the lies they are willing to tell themselves."

They drank in silence again.

Hathaway spoke. "Some things people do are so awful that they deserve to be haunted by them later on. Blethyn could not have thought that what he did in Iraq was okay."

"It was a war situation, James. People do all sorts of terrible things under stress."

"Blethyn and his friends weren't in heavy combat, sir. They just took advantage of the chaos, like the people who stole from the museums. They would not have behaved that way here in England."

"Some people do behave that way here in England. That's why we have jobs."

"Exactly so. Because that sort of shite is illegal. And immoral. And just plain wrong. Sir." The sergeant burped quietly.

"You're right," Lewis admitted, "But what if they really did make a mistake and thought they were at a house of prostitution? What if they didn't realize how young the girl was?"

"What happens overseas, is supposed to stay overseas, eh, sir? Still wrong. Nobody forced them to go into that house and do what they did. And Blethyn could have refused to go along."

The older man shuddered, thinking of his Lyn, how innocent and fragile she had been at age 14. "I know, I know. I'm not excusing those b…ba…bastards. I just want to understand how someone like that writer could have….It's hard to dredge up much sympathy for him. But it's his family and his fiancé who have to carry the guilt of his crime-and the pain of his suicide- for the rest of their lives."

They looked into their drinks, both thinking about Hathaway's near miss with the overdose of pills.

Lewis cleared his throat. "By the way, something was delivered to the office for you. It made its way through channels and I found it on my desk. Since it wasn't leaking blood or ticking, I brought it along. Here."

Hathaway set down his beer bottle and unwrapped the small package. "It's a copy of the _Holy Quran_. A beautiful book, isn't it, sir. I will have to start studying Arabic now."

"Please don't. Innocent finds out, she'll have you transferred to terrorism prevention, like. Anyway, it looks like it has English translations."

"There's a note inside."Hathaway read aloud: '_A place in paradise is reserved for he who makes his companions laugh. From Malik Abdul Hassan, with many thanks._'"

"Nice kid. And no fool. Never doubted him for a minute. Have another beer."

"Thanks." Hathaway carefully set the sacred text aside. "Am I old enough now for you to tell me what Mrs. Banbury wanted to do to you?"

"No. And if we have our way you'll nivver be aad enough. Aye, but she was one bawdy aad wife. I'll bet she was something in her day." He shook his head, smiling.

"Then, let me tell you about Sir Thomas Aquinas, sir. Speaking of bawdy."

"Why the hell not? I've had enough of Blethyn and his ugly secrets."

"He wanted to be a priest and ran away to join up. Aquinas, not Blethyn. His family didn't approve, thought he was nuts and throwing his life away. So they had him kidnapped and dragged back home."

"Wow."

"Sir, I think you are getting drunk. Anyway, his brother hired a prostitute to make sure he was cured of wanting to be a priest."

"Well, was he? Cured of the priest thing?"

"Of course not—he sent the tart away with a flea in her ear. And went on to become one of the greatest theologians in history."

"Amazing."

"Have another beer, sir?"

"Why aye. Think about how… how things could have gone the other way. Maybe if the brother had found a better looking lovely for Sir Thomas Bloody Aquinas."

He looked at Hathaway speculatively. "Who would have gotten you out of your cassock, James? Angelina Jolie could have done it, I'll bet. Or maybe that Brad Pitt, depending on the week. You being all ambiguous and mysterious, like." He winked broadly and was rewarded with a coughing fit from Hathaway.

Lewis pounded his sergeant on the back and said, "Hey, I want to secure my place in paradise, too, me lad. Listen up. A priest, a rabbi and a blind man went into a bar….."

And the two rather lonely detectives, who spent their days pursuing justice-a grim and often thankless endeavor—spent the rest of a quiet evening in one another's company and shared a few laughs, enjoying their tiny taste of paradise on earth.


End file.
